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"In the second edition of WTM, which I borrowed from the library as I'm holding out for the 3rd edition before I rebuy (if there will be one) SWB's main recommendation is the Biology: A Self-Teaching Guide although Apolgia is listed as an alternative. I'll number the questions to make it easier to see as there are a number of them here. 1. Has anyone used the self-teaching one by Steven D Garber (in the Wiley's series)? 2. If so, how did it work?" We used the Self-Teaching Guide. I really disliked it, but dc said they wanted to do it. They added plenty of outside reading, reports, and an experiment here and there to it. That's the only thing that 'saved' it, IMO. "4. How about Apologia?" We looked at Apologia and didn't like it. Sloppy use of the scienctific language, dh said. As a side note, I found it interesting that 19yod took the Iowa test not long ago (her idea, not mine) and scored in the high 90's in science. Her other scores were no surprise to me, but I *was* surprised how high the science. I was already thinking that science was one of those subjects that aren't really subjects, and this more of less confirmed it for me :) Anyway, HTH. KathyP

the most obvious book is the Bible - things like not marrying an unbeliever, being good stewards of ALL the Lord has blessed them with (not just money), living to serve vs a self-centered life, etc., etc. You know ... all the basic principles in the Bible itself. I'd make sure they had them all down cold. Then, something that's worked well for us is to read tons and tons of Christian bio's together (aloud). We discuss and discuss, as a group and individually, these books. I've found them at various places - internet (google Christian bio), hs catalogs (Sonlight is good), Reformation Heritage catalog, etc. You'll have to search these for yourself. I'm at the library and don't have time - no net at home. Sorry. Also, when you read one book, esp. if it's an old one, look in the back for lists of other books. I've found some of the best books that way. Ex: "Unlisted Legion" had a great list in the back, if I remember correctly. I also search places like abebooks.com specifically for bio's 50 or more years old. They're often more interesting (think less censored!). We're also currently reading "A Treatise on Earthly-Mindedness" by Jeremiah Burroughs and plan to read lots of Puritan writings. You'd have to research that one, too. Reformation Heritage sells plenty of Puritan writings. And some are free on the net. No copyrights. We've also read much of John MacArthur's books. He does "Grace to You" (radio), etc. And he has a bio list on his website that's pretty good. HTH, KathyP

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All 5 dc and I have been using this for over a year and really like it. They are all working at the same pace. (I am WAY behind them. It took me forever just to learn the alphabet. :) Oldest ds (at home) did Vol. I of Bluedorn's Greek and said he liked the Mounce program better. HTH, Kathy

Funny you should ask. One of our ds's just happened to have written the below paper about Saxon. He insisted on reading it to all of us and we about died laughing. I thought I would post it to add a little humor. Please take it that way and enjoy. Dear Saxon Inc., Although I understand your philanthropic inclination to occupy men with that which delights them, I hardly think the mentally deranged are fit to be writing textbooks. Neither are they qualified, however much collegiate activity they have undergone, to author materials that will so directly influence the thoughts of others. A man ought to be orderly, concise, clear, and, in short, tolerable if he hopes to be perceived as a catalyst of learning rather than an inhibitor and retarder of learning. One should at least restrain or instruct those that have difficulty with the most elementary attempts at mental activity; but it is clear from your textbooks that you gave the lunatics whose masterpiece it is free reign. Indeed, having finished as much as was tolerable (through the paradoxical “Advanced Mathematicsâ€), I have begun to suspect that your textbooks were intended to destroy any ability to utilize mathematics in a lucid or useful manner, and were rather an attempt to see to it that those who paid for the privilege of being desperately confused and frustrated not only were rendered inept at the skill your books so ludicrously professed to teach, but loathed the entire topic altogether and shuddered whenever anyone who was fortunate enough to not have been abused by your attempts at instruction so much as murmured the word math. Take, for instance, the excerpt from Advanced Mathematics, where your lunatics declare the core philosophy behind their teaching: “There is nothing to understand here…â€[1] First of all, even if there weren’t, and your staff had discovered the first truth which cannot be understood or explained, how in the world would they know there’s nothing to understand? It is a metaphysical impossibility that those with properly proportioned cerebral matter would flatly reject. Secondly, why say so if there is nothing to understand? Thirdly, there is something to understand: the rule and its application. The most impressive feat of chaos and digression was the extensive demolition of relevance in successive “lessons.†Each new lesson had less to do with the last as I progressed forward, and none of it seemed to have any relevance to that mysterious sphere that your staff is doing all it can to render its victims least capable of functioning in: reality. A lesson on what would otherwise be known as geometry would then be followed by a lesson on what once resembled polynomial equations. Once in a while, to thoroughly befuddle the struggling pupil and keep him off guard, a successive lesson would have relevance to the last, which would create a temporary illusion of structure and successive order that would be thoroughly eradicated by the next seventy lessons, after which another brief peep at a distant and mysterious world of reason and order would be afforded. Especially torturous were the lessons plotted with exceptional lunacy in which two, and sometimes three, unrelated topics would be thrust into the feeble brain of the imprisoned in quick succession, causing the most painful contortions and excruciating deformations of the brain. Then the brain would be stretched on the rack as it was forced to recall lesson two while doing lesson one hundred and two, for those address the topic of probabilities. The dementators certainly achieved a level of disquiet in their dementees that will never quite leave them, and whatever process of dissolution they used to stamp out order, it resulted in a condition that more closely resembles the final state of entropy than any other scientifically observed phenomenon I know of. One thing I can say in favor of your books. They have further driven me to passionately seek solace and sanctuary in activities that least resemble mathematics, particularly imaginative writing, film-making, and whimsical musicking. So in a way, your program has enabled me to write intricately sarcastic epistles to you nincompoops who don’t have the temerity to dare to be normal, and prefer to hide behind book covers and poke at the eyes of anyone who dares to open your self-proclaimed “incriminating development†in an attempt to analyze your bizarre methods of instruction. (In fact, I’m supposed to be doing math right now.) I am indebted to you on this account, for—who knows?—had I had the minutest inclination toward anything which remotely resembled mathematics, I might have become a sharp physicist, or a rich accountant, or an exploring astronaut, or a successful businessman, or a peaceful astronomer, or an inventor, or an engineer, or a chemist, or a mathematician. But, thanks to you, I need not fear these prospects. No. Instead I will brave the world without the comforting security of math, which would have allowed me to ease through what I will now have to work and agonize for, and so I will appreciate my successes more because they will be dearer to me by virtue of their scarcity, and when the day comes that I am confronted with a dilemma of the mathematical nature, I can proudly declare to my peers that my ineptitude in that area is complete, and that I, unlike them, must procure answers by the sweat of my brow when my brain expands and forces out the excess hydration as I proceed upon a path of my own invention toward a goal of unknown nature with a variable certainty. Yes! Unencumbered with enlightenment, unhindered by formulae or laws, I will careen happily through life full of wonder at the number of phenomena that I cannot explain! Able to think freely in more creative manners via the vast unmet capacity of my brain, I will sit and think upon simple problems for hours, approaching them in ways no one thought possible before the advent of SAXON. Great will be my delight and surprise when, if ever, I enter a mathematical problem and solve it—and emerge unscathed. (But fortunately for me, I will not even be in a position to be exposed to the harmful effects of math.) Tilting my head and leaning about drunkenly, I will attempt to drain those scattered but relevant streams of mathematical teaching that have sunk into the dark recesses of my brain into the same puddle, and, shaking my head with a grimace, I will mix the cerebral sludge and hope that a solution will result that will dissolve my problems. And how thankful I am that you have taught me the value of a constant companion, for such is my calculator, without whom I cannot function in a mathematical scenario. Indeed, in the numerical face of adversity, I can confidently wield my tiny utensil and hope its batteries don’t die as I ruthlessly pick at the granite edifice of stupidity blocking my unadvisedly easy path to success. I will be older and wiser when I get there. So it is, my friends, I am indebted to the lunatics that you conscripted to craft this, their masterwork; and, without even a warning label or an apology, you have strewn these books across America to teach Americans the value of work, patience, and exertion, and continue our preeminence as the nation that so amuses and thereby entertains all other nations. I am, therefore, as millions of others, deeply indebted to you for what you have wrought, and am thinking hard of the most effective manner in which to return your favor. Sincerely, Alex [1] I looked for hours but couldn’t find the exact page where this quote was. My brother and I remember it very clearly, however, so it exists. Let me know if you find it.